Eight is Enough Q&A with Jeffrey Ross and Jann M. Contento

1. Do you have any unusual habits that either aid or detract from your writing?

Jeff: I would like to think that I am able to almost clinically detach myself from American life—sort of like a mannequin watching the crowds pass by, staring at me, then moving past. I hope I am able to write from an observational posture, scientist-like, without mucking up my prose with too much subjectivity.

Jann: Detraction: Steaming fresh vegetables while preparing for a wholesome meal. Aid: When developing character’s ideology attachments and romantic themes, I often take long nature walks, armed with a spiral notebook and small sack of cashews.

2. Say you’re writing the best scene you’ve ever written. It’s poignant, it’s heart wrenching, it’s utterly perfect. Every sentence makes you sob with the beauty of it all. You are so close to finishing, but you need a moment to think of the next crucial line of dialogue. And then somebody comes into the room and peers over your shoulder. “Hey, whatcha working on?” they yell into your ear, words garbled by a mouthful of the special snack you were saving for yourself as a reward for finishing the most fantastic scene in the history of ever. How do you respond?

Jeff: I am so process and draft-oriented that such a disturbance would probably be helpful to me. I’m no sculpture, but for me, writing an essay or story is like chiselling a pre-existing form out of marble or granite. I can be interrupted, because the momentary pause may allow me to get a better cut, a cleaner stroke, after review or further contemplation.

Jann: I sensibly collect myself and my fractured thought. After a brief sigh, I comment to the disrupter that I am writing a letter of complaint to the city regarding the disruptive nature of automated garbage pick-up.

3. When asked when they first discovered their love for writing, most people will say their childhood. So I won’t waste your time by asking something I already pretty much know the answer to. What I want to know is when you decided to go pro, instead of just writing as a hobby.

Jeff: I had written a few “minor” academic articles throughout my career. But when “The Elusive It” [a review on my own teaching career and my inability to find a professor’s job at a four year school] was published as a Views Piece on Insidehighered.com back in 2007, I sensed that I may have discovered a niche. The numerous blogged comments to that piece gave me great confidence to continue writing in my “contrarian” vein.

Jann: My university colleagues provided constructive feedback, critical analysis, and sound advice. I was also encouraged after co-authoring a number of academic pieces.

4. If you could meet your characters in real life, do you think you’d get along with them?

Jeff: I have met them all in real life—in some shape shifter form another. Some I have loved, some were friends, and all were victims.

Jann: I find the cast is quite entertaining. Guitar Bob Zontarg would certainly be an enjoyable chap to share a beer, and Mr. Allworth is a gentleman worth exploring. I also find favour with Celeste Maria Angelica, the attractive compassionate and committed young revolutionary. The image of her outfitted in traditional jockey attire: knee high polished boots, pink-colored silk blouse, and tan riding helmet, offers a certain appeal.

5. What is one thing that you would like the non-writers in your life to understand about writing?

Jann: The threat of exposing one’s “buried life” can be frightening.
Jeff: When people hear that I have written a novel, they always continue the conversation by saying, “Oh, I’m going to start working on a book too.” I think there is a disconnect between readers and writers—I don’t believe there is a great deal of magic involved in the writing process—the muses are nurtured, so to speak, by practice and hard work. Writing book length fiction, I have discovered, that approaches organic unity—well, my friends, that is hard work.

6. When there is a scene you’ve written that you just adore, do you feel satisfied with a job well done, or are you suspicious that it may actually suck?

Jeff: I come back to my scenes, to my characters, numerous times. When I mentally declare a scene finished, I am comfortable with it. Later I may go back to add some enhancement phrasing [to help connect all the scenes imagery or ideas better], but I never quit till a scene feels “right” or packaged or complete.

Jann: Not really, most critical reads are marginalized by re-writes and personal convictions

7. What is one mistake you’ve made while trying to market yourself and your book(s)? Conversely, what’s one bit of promotion you’ve done that worked out better than expected?

Jeff: An error I continue to make, I think, is that the general reading public is as excited about my work as I am. I’m not sure about the social media, either (twitter, Facebook, linked in). But I am very happy that I have some good working relationships with significant online publications like Cronk News and Insidehighered.com. Writing for them, and trying to meet their high expectations, has given me confidence about a new career as a writer of fiction. I am trying to promote myself as an Op Ed writer turned novelist—we’ll see how this works out.

Jann: On the positive side, writing for on-line publications, like Cronk News and Inside Higher Ed. (i.e., parody poetry, satire) provided a level of satisfaction and boosted confidence.

8. Based on the amount of writer characters Stephen King introduces that wind up inhaling a big old batch of insanity peppers, it seems as though he would have us believe that writing is a dangerous profession. Do you agree?

Jeff: Well, I can list quite a few writers (V Woolf, E. Hemingway, E Poe, S. Plath, her son, just to name a few) who were unable to cope with life. Art, my friends, is powerful and dangerous. I hope I can hold myself together. Hah.

Jann: Dangerous to one’s soul, possibly.

Last but not least, in three hundred words or less, please pimp your latest project.

We believe College Leadership Crisis: The Philip Dolly Affair is the first community college novel. It is funny, educational, powerful, descriptive, and even has several suggestions about how to improve education culture. Each of you hears the whispered truths (about promotions, how funds are used, wasted projects, athletics, and romances). Well, we get right at these issues. And— PDA is a Voice of the Times—we mention Occupy Wall Street, wealth redistribution, and won’t quit in our discussions of leadership buffoonery. Phil Dolly Affair has it all, my friends—romance, poetry, drama, meetings, speeches, and pet ducks. ACH. Wait—there’s more! PDA has socialists, Marxists, Argentine freedom fighters, the JFK assassination, crazed retired professors, and maybe even communists! Thanks.

If you would like to learn more about The Philip Dolly Affair, please visit Jeff and Jann's blog, like them on Facebook, or follow them on Twitter.

CONTEST: The authors will be giving away a novel-companion e-form [PDF] “chapbook” of poetry “voiced” by one of the novel’s characters, panish Professor Jack Frost, to one randomly drawn commenter

Do Clothes Make the Woman?

Last week, Skyla Dawn Cameron was kind enough to do a guest post about creating realistic, strong female characters. If you haven't read it, you really should.

In the comments section, we had a bit discussion about clothing, and whether or not a female character is just as empowered wearing a full suit of armour as she is wearing a chainmail bikini.

This is a subject that I think about a lot. Not so much about the bikini, but just the difference between empowerment and exploitation. There are many land mines a woman must avoid while she is discovering how to embrace and express her sexuality. Is she doing it for her, or is she doing it for "him"? I honestly don't know, but it does appear as though the only acceptable form female sexual expression is when it caters to male sexual expression.

Is it too much of a generalization to say that a woman who kicks ass in a thong is a lot less threatening than a woman who kicks ass in proper combat gear?

Today, I read this article on the movie Sucker Punch. Again, great article and it raises some very good points. But what really got my attention was this comment by a poster named D.M. Kenyon:

I have to agree that there is ground being taken in Sucker Punch, sort of.

As a literary advocate of woman as warrior, I think that it is an advance to see women depicted as powerful and violent, if that is what it takes to get the message across. I am more persuaded by Michelle Rodriguez in “Machete” than perhaps I am by Sucker Punch. Ms. Rodriguez has almost become the quintessential character actress depicting woman as warrior, though I am still personally a devoted groupie of Michelle Yeoh of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon fame.

Violence as a metaphor for power and a context to display courage and other virtues has seen a variety of women heroes of late. I am still concerned that so many of them use rocket launchers wearing high-heels and sports bras. This is still sissified combat apparel and is really still sexual objectification for the 21st Century. I think male domination is still subverting the image of women as warrior, meaning woman who makes a kick-ass difference, as his own sexual fantasy. Heroism is not about sex, it is about determination, commitment and compassion. And yet, the sexual objectification of hero, be it woman or man, will most likely always be tied to notions of sexual virility and probably will never find any other image in mass media.

If you want to really see what a true woman hero looks like, however, see the Wikipedia entry for Mary Edwards Walker, the only woman to ever win the Congressional Medal of Honor. Don’t expect to see a sports bra.

Again, awesome points. I always appreciate reading such opinions because they're so much more articulate than anything I can manage. I consider myself a feminist, but I'm not very good at explaining my reasoning when something screams "sexist!" to me. It's just a gutteral reaction I get, and I find it hard to translate that into a convincing argument. I'm just not cut out for the debate team.

Fortunately, there are people who know how to nail it, and with humour no less.

Mental Illness is a Bitch

It's been a long week.

As you may know, the universe decided to throw septic tanks full of crap my way during 2011. I was hoping 2012 would be different, but it got off to a bad start when my 16 year old cat was diagnosed with cancer in January and had to be put to sleep the day before I went in for surgery.

Life throws these kinds of curveballs, and there isn't a heck of a lot you can do to prevent it. If you're like me, you just used to it. Sort of. As much as you can. You remind yourself that there are people worse off in the world than you, that you've been through worse yourself and survived. You remember all the people who love you and all the other good things you have going. Day by day, you get a little stronger and a little wiser, and life marches on.

But sometimes, for some reason, some stupid, piddly little thing throws everything out of kilter. It's like how a paper cut can hurt like hell even though it's barely deep enough to draw blood.

When you have a mental disease, these stupid, piddly little things get blown up into huge monsters of chaos and destruction, and it's so easy to forget about logic and just get carried away by nonsense.

This is what happened to me this week.

I've been doing very well since my surgery. I'm recovering well, and I've used to opportunity to get work done on Masquerade. In fact, I had high hopes of finishing it by the time I had to go back to work. Then my husband innocently mentioned that my time off was almost up, and I'd be back at work in less than 2 weeks.

Suddenly, panic. Must finish this book. Must write. But my brain didn't want to cooperate anymore. It was too busy telling me how lazy I am, how stupid I am, how I procrastinate. And then it convinces me that I've wasted my life and makes me relive every agonizing moment where I've felt like a useless waste of space.

Okay. I can handle that. My brain gets caught in these loops because of my anxiety disorder, and I can power through it.

But then I go onto Goodreads and I read something about my first novel THIEF that once again sets me off. It wasn't even a bad thing. The reader said that they really enjoyed the book. The reader has, in fact, given it 5 out ot 5 stars, given it a nice review, and is mentioning it in a few different places. All good.

What was this thing that set me off? It's not even worth mentioning. It was an aside that someone said in response to something the reader said. Nothing to do with the quality of the book, or my ability as a writer. Just a remark that maybe the only reason I am working on more books featuring the same characters is because I was given a 3 book contract.

I'm not going to list all the negative places that comment took my brain to, because they are completely irrational and, well, crazy. My mental illness made me ignore all the positives of that exchange, and focus on the negatives which the person obviously never intended.

You can't trust mental illness. It lies. I know this. There is a part of me that remains clear headed when I get into one of these spirals, but its voice is tiny compared to the chattering, self hating nonsense the rest of me spews.

The most frustrating part of this nonsense is that it effectively paralyzes me. I guess it takes up a lot of energy to have a mental spazz attack, so all I've done this week is lay on the couch, watch Law and Order, and stuff my face with soy turkey slices. All the while, I'm remembering what my husband said, and I can hear the clock ticking down. I have to go back to work soon, and apparently my brain is interpreting that as I'll never finish Masquerade now, and why should I because the only reason I'm writing it is because I am contracted to write it.

Again, lies. Although I won't make the deadline I set for myself, there is nothing to stop me from continuing to write once I'm back at work. That's how I wrote everything else I've written. And the reason I started writing Masquerade, two YEARS before signing any contracts, was because it's a story I want to tell.

This is what mental illness does, and I hate it. I hate how it makes me feel, I hate how it makes me give up on myself. And I hate how it makes other people view me. I wrote this blog post because I don't want to be ashamed of how my brain works. I don't want to give it to all the bad thoughts I've been pounding myself with. And I want to reach out to others who suffer with the same problems.

It's a disease that isolates us from each other, and makes us feel like we are alone. Let's fight that. If you have a story you'd like to share of your mental illness, please do.